The hand in progress

Nothing like shaking hands with yourself, now is there?

This is the hand halfway out of the mold. I got it this far before I had to cut.

On the right is the hand just starting to come out of the mold. I reinforced the back of the mold with gauze to strengthen it. That wasn't what gave me problems. Where the difficulties came from was the space (or lack thereof) between the fingers. *sigh*

A photo at last.
The resin hand.
This started with a mold of my hand (try that by yourself). That was followed by a plaster "master". From that I poured the resin.
Of course, the mold had to be destroyed to get the hand out. So, it's one of a kind!

What does it mean to be well rounded?

What does it mean to be well rounded?

Why haven’t you heard from me in a while? Because I’ve been busy being a department chair at Marist College and the fall semester has begun. Other than the pesky day job, I’ve crocheted an afghan for my step-daughter (yes, since the last entry), knitted another pair of fingerless gloves, begun another afghan and am planning a sweater for my husband for Christmas. I find that I can pick up a piece of knitting or crochet when I have just a few minutes or want to spend the whole evening.

I found a wonderful book called The Knitting Way (Linda Skolnick and Janice MacDaniels, Skylight Paths Publishing 2006) that discussed the spirituality of knitting. It really speaks to why we do some of the things that we do.

But, my point was this. On the one side, I’m a college professor. On another, a consumer behaviorist. On another, a resin crafter. On another, a crocheter, knitter, seamstress, organic gardener, wife and doggy mother. By the time you put all the sides together, you have a ball, hence, well-rounded.

You may argue that we are all a collection of interests (or in the terms of psychographics, activities, opinions and interests) but how far should we reach in our blogs, on our websites, and in our web stores? This summer, on LinkedIn, we had a discussion of how far to push a brand. I argued that you needed consistency (well… I do have a PhD in marketing). But, you also need to stay fresh and timely and you never know what an offshoot is going to take root (too much of a metaphor?)

Last year, I had the great fun of being guest author on TackyLiving.com.
As my usual, eclectic self, I’d been cruising the internet for unusual things. So far, I’d found:
The Gallery of Regrettable Food (by James Lileks, available at Amazon and half.com) He also brought us Interior Desecration (I always knew the 70s would come back to haunt us).
WhatNotToCrochet
and
CakeWrecks
Who knew there were so many fun, frighteningly tacky things??

As a marketing professor and researcher of consumer behavior, it got me thinking about tackiness.
We all know that what is tasteful for one person is tacky for another (I’d learned that quite thoroughly in retail). But, what makes tacky? Are there things that are tacky for everyone?
And, what’s kitsch? Is it the same thing as tacky?
Somewhere I read that kitsch is only kitsch if one is unaware of its tackiness. Hmmm… That would mean that no one enjoys collecting kitsch. (Either that’s a huge disappointment or circular thinking.)
I noticed that this month, WhatNotToCrochet asks the question, “What’s the point where something slips from cute to FUG?”
Of course, it answers, “there – no just behind that”.
Okaaayyyyyyy. Something tells me that answer won’t get me into the Journal of Marketing. But, it brings up a really good point.
Is tackiness like pornography? We can’t define it but we’ll know it when we see it?

As a resin crafter with a wholesale and retail following, it made sense to have a blog.
As a marketing professor, it made sense to have a blog.
As a marketing professor teaching Internet Marketing at the MBA level, I had to have a blog.

I've always seen blogs as the internet equivalent to home movies (and not the funny stuff on YouTube either, just the duller than dirt junk you gotta watch of someone else's vacation). So, in spite of my usual stream of consciousness writing, I'll clean up my act for you. If I'm gonna have a blog, it might as well be useful to someone.

Here, you'll find some of my projects and techniques (mostly of resin). Maybe someone can either learn from them or take solace in someone else making more mistakes than he/she does.

But, in the meantime, check out:
AtomicFlamingoCreations.com
or
my Etsy store:
atomicflamingo.etsy.com